Picking Up Women May Be All In Accent

Get serious!

October 23, 1990|By TONY GABRIELE Staff Writer

How about those Nobel Prize winners, huh? Isn't it something how some guys will devote their lives to achieving a great goal? What is it, do you think that makes guys work, sweat and sacrifice, without assurance of success or financial reward, for the sake of a dream?

Simple: to impress women.

This is the main thing that motivates guys. If it weren't for the need to impress women so they'd go out with you, most guys would just slouch around, drinking beer and watching football all the time, instead of just most of the time. Oh, they might also change the oil in the Buick once in a while, but that would be about it. They'd never get around to, say, organizing the Book of the Month Club or inventing Lycra spandex or anything really momentous.

Guys have always been like this. Why do you suppose the pharaohs built all those obelisks and stuff? Sure, they said they were worshipping a bunch of gods, but really. "Hey, good-looking," the pharaoh would say, "how'd you like to come up to Thebes and see my obelisk?" Sure, he got shot down a lot of times, but sometimes he succeeded.

Which is why I was so fascinated with last week's story about the guy who had a stroke and woke up Scandinavian.

Did you see that article? A doctor reported about a 33-year-old Baltimore man who had suffered a stroke, and when he recovered his speech he found himself talking with a Scandinavian accent. Apparently doctors have seen this sort of thing before; they even have a name for it, "foreign accent syndrome," although they could probably get more publicity if they called it, say, "Meryl Streep syndrome."

This is fascinating enough, but what's really interesting is that the guy liked talking that way, plus the reason that he liked it. As the doctor explained.

"He liked it because he thought it would help him pick up women."

This is an idea that has probably never once occurred to most girlchasers.

Oh, there has been a notion that a Continental accent may be alluring to some women, but we were generally thinking in terms of Charles Boyer and Marcello Mastroianni. But a Scandinavian accent? Sounds a bit surprising to me, especially after years of listening to Garrison Keillor on the radio telling funny stories about Norwegian bachelor farmers.

Not that I am trying in any way to denigrate or make fun of Norwegian farmers, no sirree! Let me assure you that I would never, ever want to cast aspersions on any ethnic or occupational group. Particularly a group that uses pitchforks.

Besides, the news article regrettably failed to include the most important information: Namely, how well was this guy doing, socially, with his Scandinavian accent? Hey, suppose he was on to something! Suppose he was making out like a bandit!

Perhaps, after all the decades of propaganda about Latin lovers, we have failed to notice that Scandinavian is sexy.

Of course, being thoroughly married, this is purely of academic interest as far as I am concerned. The last time I actively investigated the art of picking up women was when I was in college and I sought instruction from a senior who had a reputation as a ladies' man.

"Tell me," I asked him, "what's a good way to pick up women?"

"Simple," he said. "You walk up to her and put your arm across her back. Then your flex your legs, put your other arm behind her knees, say "Ups-a-daisy,' and ..."